


Same Old Song

by SydneySunshine



Category: Veronica Mars (Movie 2014)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-26
Updated: 2014-04-26
Packaged: 2018-01-20 21:54:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1527065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SydneySunshine/pseuds/SydneySunshine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>MOVIE SPOILERS.  Missing scene fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Same Old Song

**Author's Note:**

> Un beta'ed, so the inevitable errors are all mine.

It’s Gia’s face she keeps seeing as she gives her statement and goes through the motions of answering the deputy’s questions. Gia’s face as she died right in front of her and Veronica wonders if she’ll ever stop seeing it. It’s there when she closes her eyes and she blinks, shaking her head as though that will help and attempts to focus on what is being said.

She’s done. Free to go and she stumbles as she leaves the interrogation room – desperate to get away from this place and with no idea what to do next. And then Logan is there, right in front of her like a mirage. Veronica is certain her knees can’t be buckling from the sheer relief of seeing him, but she’s not sure they aren’t either and she walks into his open arms without another thought and holds on tight to what’s right in front of her. 

When she’s almost sure she can say the words without choking up, Veronica pulls away to tell him what’s happened tonight but the look on his face tells her he already knows the important parts. She has to say it anyway, because maybe if she says it out loud it will seem real. 

“Gia’s dead.”

“I know.”

“He shot Gia. Cobb. He killed Carrie.”

Saying it out loud doesn’t help, not really, and Logan’s holding her so tight it hurts as she leans back into him. Veronica can’t tell which one of them is actually trembling and which one is just holding on for the ride and she’s not sure it matters anyway so she just squeezes him back and waits for it to pass. 

They stand there like that for seconds? Minutes? Time has taken on the surreal, immeasurable quality of a wave rushing back and forth across the sand until Veronica takes a breath and focuses everything she has on standing up straight. 

“Let’s get out of here. You can – did they tell you that? You can drive to Mexico if you want. The charges —“

“Dropped. It came up while I was waiting.”

“You saw Lamb?”

“Who would then have to admit he fucked it up? Please. He sent one of his lackeys.”

They ride in silence back to her father’s empty house. Veronica is busy trying to assemble the pieces of this new reality into a shape she recognizes. Something manageable, something she can live with and she imagines he is doing much the same. Processing the facts - another dead body. Another murderer in their midst. The lyrics might have changed but the song still sounds the same. 

For a moment it’s awkward when he walks her to the door and neither of them knows what to say until she takes the fence at a rush and asks if he can stay. It’s blurted out with only a hint of panic in her voice and she’s quite proud of herself for that even as the relief she feels when he nods is mirrored back at her on Logan’s face. She doesn’t know what this new version of them will turn out to be but it’s good to know he seems to need it as much as she does. 

The talking used to be the worst part with them as they struggled to hear each other through the deafening din of their own fears and a million tiny betrayals that colored everything they heard. But time and circumstances have worn down the rough edges and laid old demons to rest and it’s easier now to hear each other. Or as easy as it will ever be when Veronica is telling the story of how someone he loved died. And of how she lived, with a weight on her back impossible to share and impossible to forget. 

Logan stands and crosses to the window, torn between relief that Veronica is here to see and touch and tell him her story, and sadness because another woman he cared about is not. Because with the burden of guilt and grief she lived with every day, is it any wonder Carrie spent so much time anesthetizing herself against the world?

“Are you okay?”

He turns back to face her as she speaks.

“That should be my line. You’ve had quite the eventful evening.”

“Yeah, well. You know me. Not my first crazed gunman.”

“Some things never change. Welcome home, Veronica Mars.”

 

It's the next morning and Logan is awake early, because apparently his internal alarm clock has no emotional trauma snooze button, and if he lies there next to Veronica’s sleeping body all he can do is think, think, think and that way lies madness so he gets up. Gets dressed. Takes comfort in that small routine, and leaves Veronica to sleep while he potters around her father’s kitchen and locates coffee and checks his phone and does anything he can to reclaim a little bit of something normal. A completely fucked up version of normal, but that's nothing new. 

He’s deep into the newspaper he finds on the front stoop - because what is normal if not devouring all the gory details of how your former girlfriend’s killer was subdued by a golf club to the head by your former, current, always Veronica – when the pounding at the door starts. 

Alert, on edge, because this is Neptune and you just never know what’s coming next, Logan is relieved to be pushed aside by Wallace who scans the living room and demands to know where Veronica is. Like Logan has her hiding under the couch. 

“She’s asleep. Don’t wake her yet.”

“But she’s here. She’s okay?”

“Yeah. Well… she’ll tell you about it. But yeah, she’s okay.”

Logan watches, fascinated, as the tension visibly drains out of Wallace and he collapses on the couch.

“Are you okay?”

Logan would have been less surprised if Wallace had come over all territorial and kicked him out of the house, but he recognizes an olive branch when he sees one and has outgrown the need to throw it back in Wallace’s face just to prove he can. Instead he shrugs and offers up the coffee pot and that’s how, when Veronica appears on the scene all bedhead and oversized t-shirts and sleepy smiles, she finds Logan and Wallace eating scrambled eggs they’ve foraged from her dad’s kitchen and rehashing the particularly fucked up social dynamics of Neptune High that have led to a longterm blackmail scheme masquerading as friendship. 

“Hey.”

Veronica’s head is still spinning after the last 48 hours and the sight of her best friend and Logan chatting like it’s the most normal thing in the world is not something she’s equipped to deal with. Fortunately before she has time to figure out what to say, Wallace is hugging her so tightly she can’t breathe and lecturing her on the advisability of bringing in backup before confronting potential murderers and it turns out that’s exactly what she needs anyway so she hugs him back and remembers what it’s like when you don’t need to say anything at all. 

She pulls back eventually because there are realities to be dealt with today and she can’t hide forever. 

“My dad. I need to call the hospital and check-“

“I talked to the nurse this morning. He’s stable. Resting comfortably. They said you can get in there after noon today to see him.”

Veronica doesn’t know why she’s shocked that Logan has thought to check for her. If the last few days have proven nothing else, they’ve demonstrated over and over again that maturity and responsibility are concepts that this adult version of the boy she knew embraces wholeheartedly. It’s a pleasant surprise, if it’s really a surprise at all, and she thanks him with a smile.

“They told you that? I thought-“

“Technically, they might have thought they were providing an update to your long lost Uncle Fred, but whatever works, right?”

“Uncle Fred?”

“So I don’t have your gift for a good alias. Sue me.”

None of them could tell you why, because nothing is really funny about the realities of this situation, but the three of them are laughing nonetheless and something about it feels familiar. To Logan, to Veronica and even to Wallace – they remember this part. The part where terrible things happen and it seems like the world will never be right side up again, but then there’s hope and friendship and laughter and a father who is resting comfortably and the conviction that maybe, someday, they’ll be okay too. 

Eventually Wallace is ordering her to put on pants while she’s got company in the house and Logan is running a reassuring hand down her back before he ducks outside to take a phone call and Veronica is remembering the things she loves about home, instead of all the bad. And it’s not like everything is fine because there’s mess everywhere she looks, but she can deal with mess. She can see her way out and that’s enough to hold onto for now.


End file.
